(Editor’s note: The meeting that had been scheduled for Friday night was cancelled in the face of inclement weather. It has not as yet been rescheduled.)

By Billy Davis

Deer hunters will have a chance to voice their opinion today about a pending hunting bill that has been introduced in the Miss. House of Representatives.

State Rep. Warner McBride, after fielding questions about the House bill, has set a public meeting for 6 p.m. at the North Miss. Fish Hatchery.

The fish hatchery is located near Interstate 55 at Enid Lake.

McBride announced the meeting Monday, saying state wildlife biologists will be in attendance to explain their view of the bill.  

McBride said he has received numerous phone calls since a story in The Clarion-Ledger announced the deer hunting bill adds more gun hunting days but would shorten archery season.

The bill passed out of the House Committee on Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks, where McBride is among the committee members and voted in favor of it.

The bill was written and introduced by the committee chair, Rep. Bo Eaton of Taylorsville.

The state’s most plentiful deer hunters are gun hunters, who would be permitted to hunt from the Saturday before Thanksgiving through January 31 if the bill is approved as written.

The gun season in Mississippi usually pauses in early December for a two-week hiatus then resumes through mid-January.

The Miss. Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks is supporting the legislation, House Bill 1282.

The increase in legal gun-hunting days comes after Mississippi has seen a jump in its white-tailed deer population, a wildlife biologist told The Clarion-Ledger.

But the Mississippi Bowhunters Association is opposing the bill because it moves up primitive weapon season to November 1, a period normally reserved for bow hunting.